Why Geniuses Don\'t Make Money
 

Well, of course they do, but proportionally they don't. Nobel Prize winners average 140+ IQs, CEO's about 120.

Harvard professors are very smart, the biggest used car dealership owner in your area is probably less intelligent.

Why the disparity and how does this apply to poker????
Well, you could argue geniuses veer away from the marketplace, enter an altruistic world of ideas, etc. where they can do the most good...Ok, there's some merit there, but i really think people move toward what they're good at.

I think, bottom line, people get rich because they understand the marketplace/consumer. Often, this is just a matter of understanding poor people. Whether you invest in small income rentals, own a chain of fast food restaurants, strip clubs, money store, mortgage co, or move up the chain in a discount retailer, you need to understand poor people and why they do what they do.

Moving on to poker, you need to be able to deal with tough players. often this means avoiding them when possible. But the live ones pay the bills. How to extract the most money from them??? You need to understand their thought processes.
I believe this is what creates the much greater earn for the hustlers than the geniuses.

Re: Why Geniuses Don\'t Make Money
 

Hustlers do a better job of learning to manipulate people. Geniuses spend their time instead learning how to better manipulate the physical world.

I think there's more money to be made in manipulating people.

Re: Why Geniuses Don\'t Make Money
 

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Well, of course they do, but proportionally they don't. Nobel Prize winners average 140+ IQs, CEO's about 120.

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Nothing in this statement suggests that there aren't more genius CEOs than Nobel Prize winners. You'd have a tough time convincing me that the average 120IQ schlob makes more money than the average guy with an IQ of 140 or 150.

Re: Why Geniuses Don\'t Make Money
 

There is evidence that the very smartest folks (as measured by the SAT) tend to become physicists while the folks a notch or two down go into law and business.

http://tinyurl.com/55tgw

Edit: and of course these are only generalities, so that nothing is to be inferred about any particular individual.

Wrong
 

Remember that historically, being a "money-changer" was a negative thing. All the way back to Aristotle the good life is a life of knowledge and political participation; having to work and make money was shameful.
We've laregly abandonned this outlook in "modern times," but I think the preference of the very, very smart remains a life of knowledge and learning, with a little politics on the side.

There are exceptions of course. Look at Bill Gates. Is he a genious? I don't know, but he is certainly a very smart man who has more money than he knows what to do with.

Re: Why Geniuses Don\'t Make Money
 

a lot of geniuses are pretty lazy and/or don't give a [censored] about money

Re: Why Geniuses Don\'t Make Money
 

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a lot of geniuses are pretty lazy and/or don't give a [censored] about money

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I think a lot of geniuses realize there really isn't much difference in the life styles of the superwealthy like Bill Gates and the average Joe Shmoo.

Stu

Re: Why Geniuses Don\'t Make Money
 

You're right - I'm a genius or close to it (see I'm modest too [img]/images/graemlins/wink.gif[/img]), and I realised that lifestyle is more important than money (and I'm pretty lazy).

Re: Why Geniuses Don\'t Make Money
 

An interesting point is that success in business is
driven more by hard work and luck, though intelligence
plays a role.

Comparing business to poker, both require certian people
skills. Poker requires less luck, and about the same
amount of intelligence/skill/hard work.

Of course, the elite in any field will tend to be more
intelligent (IMO).

Re: Why Geniuses Don\'t Make Money
 

Geniuses are smart enough to realize that money is not the source of true happiness.

Re: Why Geniuses Don\'t Make Money
 

OK; here is what I think:
You know one of the basic rules of economy: for bigger gains you need to take bigger risks.
The fact is, geniuses think too much and in too much detail. they calculate risks too well.
a highschool drop out wouldn't do that (at least not as much as a genius or a Phd).
The second fact is that, the higher the educational level of people, the less risks they take.
Just to give you an example, they never prefer ppl with Masters or Phd degrees for Trading and stock exchange jobs. Why? because they are too risk averse.

Now your second question: How would geniuses do in Poker?
I think they would easily be very good 10-handed Limit Holdem players.
Put them in short-handed and/or No Limit situations and they will be eaten alive.

Re: Why Geniuses Don\'t Make Money
 

</font><blockquote><font class="small">Svar till:</font><hr />
Geniuses are smart enough to realize that money is not the source of true happiness.

[/ QUOTE ]

Bingo.

Re: Why Geniuses Don\'t Make Money
 

Some of the generalizations and prejudices shown here are entertaining. I work with the very rich and the very smart. Anyone familiar with a list of extremely wealthy people, either in their own neighborhood or in the nation, knows the distribution of "very intelligent" and "street smart" is about equal. Different people are driven by different motives. In the case of those who seek the creation of business, the ability to score large numbers on tests is sometimes matched by the ability to lead. There are occassions, statistical aberations, when the very stupid get super rich(insert favorite example here) and the very intelligent retrieve carts in the Walmart parking lot, but in general, nature tends to even things out.

Re: Why Geniuses Don\'t Make Money
 

I've always been under the impression that there is no such thing as a lazy genius. Those people are called fools.

Re: Why Geniuses Don\'t Make Money
 

Your logic is faulty. The average IQ of Nobel Prize winners is higher than CEO because you typically need a higher IQ to be a Nobel Prize winner than a CEO.

A more useful comparison is to compare the percentage of people with an IQ of 140+ who are CEOs to the percentage of people with an IQ of 120-140 who are CEOs.

I am not sure what the answer would be, but I am absolute sure that if you did the same comparison for Poker results rather than CEOship, the higher IQ players would on average have better results.

Oh, and the best hustlers are geniuses.

Re: Why Geniuses Don\'t Make Money
 

What is a genius? In Greece the genius was the guy who would achieve to think beyond the real world.

Re: Why Geniuses Don\'t Make Money
 

Just because someone can do something, doesn't mean they want to.

Re: Why Geniuses Don\'t Make Money
 

In Canada we call those people 'winos'.

Re: Why Geniuses Don\'t Make Money
 

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Geniuses are smart enough to realize that money is not the source of true happiness.

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I'm not convinced that geniuses are happier than average people.

Re: Why Geniuses Don\'t Make Money
 

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Geniuses are smart enough to realize that money is not the source of true happiness.

[/ QUOTE ]

I'm not convinced that geniuses are happier than average people.

[/ QUOTE ]

Re: Why Geniuses Don\'t Make Money
 

I suggest that there just isn’t a correlation between intelligence and a desire to make money.

I suggest that anyone even approaching normal intelligence who has the desire and who is willing to do what is necessary can get rich.

A side note: I don’t know if this is still the case but at the time I was looking for a “career” (30 or so years ago), the big corporations specifically did not want people with very high IQs, except for those directly involved in scientific endeavors. 120 was about the cap for general business related jobs. The thinking was that smart people tend to rock the boat.

Re: Why Geniuses Don\'t Make Money
 

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there just isn’t a correlation between intelligence and a desire to make money.

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In other words: IQ is not the same as motivation/desire.



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The thinking was that smart people tend to rock the boat.

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Agreed.

But the truly smart people are smart enough to keep their opinions to themselves and NOT rock the boat.


Or if they have an idea that is truly worth implementing they will be smart enough to bring it up at the appropriate time when it is most likely to received positively.


This approaches different levels of intelligence. People skills don't necessarily correlate to IQ.


Stupid people with strong people-skills can go further than smart people with poor people skills.

Re: Why Geniuses Don\'t Make Money
 

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But the truly smart people are smart enough to keep their opinions to themselves and NOT rock the boat.

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Firmly disagree. Politicians and ass kissers, yes – but not necessarily smart people – because –

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People skills don't necessarily correlate to IQ.

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In fact, there is some evidence that the correlation is inverse.

And don’t forget, when it comes to getting a job, if your are obviously much smarter than your boss-to-be he is much more likely to fear you than to hire you.

Re: Why Geniuses Don\'t Make Money
 

[ QUOTE ]
A side note: I don’t know if this is still the case but at the time I was looking for a “career” (30 or so years ago), the big corporations specifically did not want people with very high IQs, except for those directly involved in scientific endeavors. 120 was about the cap for general business related jobs. The thinking was that smart people tend to rock the boat.

[/ QUOTE ]

How exactly did they determine your IQ in those days? Did they infer it from speaking to you as David Sklansky has (seriously) stated he is able to do?

Re: Why Geniuses Don\'t Make Money
 

The applicant was given a battery of tests to determine IQ, aptitude, personality type, psychological fitness, etc.

I’m not familiar with Sklansky’s claim but I see no reason to doubt it. Vocabulary and sentence structure themselves are very good indicators of intelligence. Add in a few intentionally probing questions and, well, even people who are not very bright tend to eventually realize that a smart person is smart.

Re: Why Geniuses Don\'t Make Money
 

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Vocabulary and sentence structure themselves are very good indicators of intelligence.

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This is very incorrect.

Re: Why Geniuses Don\'t Make Money
 

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This is very incorrect.

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That’s a very convincing argument – as well as, perhaps, evidence as to which of us is right.

Re: Wrong
 

Bill Gates made his money because he knew how to read a contract. When IBM first approached him to license his operating system, he read the agreement and noticed there was nothing barring him from selling his OS the other computer companies. He asked them about this. IBM, in their arrogance, basically answered his question "other computer companies??? Bwah-ha-ha-ha, that's the funniest thing weve ever heard." The rest, as they say, is history.

Is Gates a genius? Someone (Edison, maybe?) once said genius was 10% inspiration and 90% perspiration. Gates was notoious for his inhuman work schedule. I've heard it said that a typical work "day" for Gates was, arrive at work 7 AM Monday and leave, 11 PM Wednesday.

Re: Why Geniuses Don\'t Make Money
 

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if your are obviously much smarter than your boss-to-be he is much more likely to fear you than to hire you.

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exactly....so the TRULY smart ones should be better able to 'tone it down' when it matter instead of coming off as being 'too' smart.

Re: Why Geniuses Don\'t Make Money
 

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People skills don't necessarily correlate to IQ.

[/ QUOTE ] [img]/images/graemlins/wink.gif[/img]

Re: Why Geniuses Don\'t Make Money
 

higher IQ's tend to make more money up to a point.
TAke your average IQ of the Harvard graduating class.
Average IQ say 130.
Among those if you compare IQ's to income say 10 years later you will find little correlation between the two, and a Strong correlation between AQ and income.
Adversity Quotent (Paul Stoltz) The ability to deal with adversity in the workplace.

web page 115-124 - Above average (e.g., university students)
125-134 - Gifted (e.g., post-graduate students)
135-144 - Highly gifted (e.g., intellectuals)
145-154 - Genius (e.g., professors)
155-164 - Genius (e.g., Nobel Prize winners)
165-179 - High genius
180-200 - Highest genius
&gt;200 - "Unmeasurable genius"


As for geniuses, they tend to gravitat to genius jobs, which don't make nearly as much money as top CEO type jobs.
Conductors, professors, researchers, artists.

what income would you rather have top law professor or top lawer?? Conductor of the London Philharmonic Symphony or
Snoop Dog?? hahahah

Mindflayer

Missing The Point
 

The many assertions that geniuses "choose" to do things for altruistic/pure/high minded purposes and pursue knowledge because they somehow see the ludicrousness of money are way off the mark.

The popular QB in high school didn't get 1600 on his SAT...because he couldn't. It wasn't because he was too busy with sports, partying or nailing cheerleaders. He didnt get the 1600 because he couldn't.

And as much as it pains the self-described genius types, they dont earn huge....because they can't. That's it. That's the point.

At chow time big dogs eat first and eat most. Money is chow. The assertion that anyone doesn't want to be the big dog is idiotic.

Re: Missing The Point
 

Or maybe intelligent people derive so much enjoyment from intellectual pursuits that they chose them despite the lower income potential? Do people not have different preferences, determined by their tastes?

Your line of reasoning assumes that money (and the things one can do with it) is (/are) the ultimate object of desire for all people. Clearly this is not true.

Re: Missing The Point
 

"To a kid lookin' up to me, life ain't nothing but bitches and money"

Thats honest. You are not.

Re: Missing The Point
 

That's an opinion, not a fact.

Re: Missing The Point
 

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That's an opinion, not a fact.

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Exactly. You make money based on opinions. Hopefully substantiated by reseach, market trends, etc.


But at the heart of it, if you wait for the facts, its too late.

Re: Why Geniuses Don\'t Make Money
 

I'd like to see some data that support your conclusion. I think, but can't prove, that some of the top players have very high IQs.

Regards,

Al

Re: Why Geniuses Don\'t Make Money
 

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I'd like to see some data that support your conclusion. I think, but can't prove, that some of the top players have very high IQs.

Regards,

Al

[/ QUOTE ]

Absolutely, in fact I would argue that success in Poker correlates more closely with IQ than success (money) in the "real" world.

That being said, at the top (read this from Negreanu, Greenstein and others) unless a player has some hustle and gamboool in him, he's gets eaten alive.

Essentially in life, an unbelievably high IQ ensures one a place in the middle/upper middle class in direct proportion to which it excludes him from the ranks of the incredibly rich.

His place in the economic spectrum is akin to the place women occupy in the IQ Bell shaped curve.

Re: Why Geniuses Don\'t Make Money
 

To qualify for Mensa, one must score in the top 2 percent of the general population on an accepted standardized intelligence test. This doesn't necessarily qualify one as a genius, but it definitely indicates a higher intelligence.

Let's look at this from an EV-like perspective: Assume a population of 1,000,000. The top 2% in IQ would be 20,000, leaving 980,000 as "non-genius". Let's say the top 5% of the "non-genius" population are making the big money. That's 49,000 people. Even if ALL the smart people were making a lot of money, they would still be dwarfed by the less intelligent by about 2.5 to 1.

Every statistic I've ever seen indicates higher intelligence and/or higher education is directly proportional to higher income.

Back to poker. A major portion of standardized IQ tests involves PATTERN RECOGNITION. Just because the tests concentrate on shapes and other such things, this doesn't mean that pattern recognition can't be applied to people as well. People, poker hands, emotions...all have patterns that can be recognized, evaluated, and exploited. Other parts include mathematics and time-limited problem solving. A good poker player uses all these things every hand. I actually see no difference between street smart, people smart, or math smart people. They each can succeed in their own way... and make money.

Re: Why Geniuses Don\'t Make Money
 

Bingo. Finally.